The Scheme Programming Language, 3rd Edition (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"I have been using previous editions of The Scheme Programming Language in my Programming Language Concepts class for 13 years. The students need to learn the basics of Scheme in a few days, and then to pick up some of the harder concepts as the course progresses. This terse but complete book with its excellent examples fits the bill perfectly. Students quickly learn a lot from this book, and many of them make a point of telling me how much they like it."
—Claude Anderson, Professor of Computer Science and Software Engineering, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology

"Kent Dybvig's The Scheme Programming Language is to Scheme what Kernighan and Ritchie's The C Programming Language is to C."
—Daniel P. Friedman, Indiana University

"This third edition builds on the strengths of the previous editions and provides a comprehensive, no-nonsense introduction to Scheme. The combination of solidity and finesse displayed in this book makes it a reference text for educated computer scientists. The accompanying software, Petite Chez Scheme, makes it the ideal starting point for any programmer who wants to extend his or her repertoire with Scheme."
—Olivier Danvy, BRICS, University of Aarhus, Denmark, co-Editor-in-Chief of Higher-Order and Symbolic Computation

Product Description

This thoroughly updated edition of The Scheme Programming Language provides an introduction to Scheme and a definitive reference for standard Scheme, presented in a clear and concise manner. Written for professionals and students with some prior programming experience, it begins by leading the programmer gently through the basics of Scheme and continues with an introduction to some of the more advanced features of the language. Many exercises are presented to help reinforce the lessons learned, and answers to the exercises are given in a new appendix. Most of the remaining chapters are dedicated to the reference material, which describes in detail the standard features of Scheme included in the Revised Report on Scheme and the ANSI/IEEE standard for Scheme. Numerous examples are presented throughout the introductory and reference portions of the text, and a unique set of extended example programs and applications, with additional exercises, are presented in the final chapter. Reinforcing the book's utility as a reference text are appendixes that present the formal syntax of Scheme, a summary of standard forms and procedures, and a bibliography of Scheme resources. The Scheme Programming Language stands alone as an introduction to and essential reference for Scheme programmers. It is also useful as a supplementary text for any course that uses Scheme. The Scheme Programming Language is illustrated by artist Jean-Pierre Hebert, who writes Scheme programs to extend his ability to create sophisticated works of digital art.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 307 pages
• Publisher: The MIT Press; 3 edition (October 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0262541483
• ISBN-13: 978-0262541480
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #317,261 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent reference, May 9, 2005

By	Ramón del Río (Lausanne, Switzerland) - See all my reviews

This is an excellent book on Scheme, that covers R5RS thoroughly. The first part is a succint tutorial, most useful for those of us with no previous knowledge of functional programming: manipulation of lists, continuations, macros, etc. It is very clear, with plenty of solved examples and exercises. The second part is a thorough reference on every keyword and function of R5RS. There is nary a reference to particular implementations of Scheme, so it should be useful to everybody.

This is a dry book. I say this to its advantage. There are no extraneous comments nor attempts at being funny, yet the text is perfectly readable.

Typography is the truly standard TeX fare, and it looks very nice and 'functional'. Format is a bit wide, which helps the book to stay open where one leaves it open.

Many useful quasi-standard features outside R5RS (ie the SRFI's) are not covered. But for learning and practicing the language itself, I doubt there is a better choice. On the other hand, the full text of the book (and a handful of errata) is available online, should you not believe me (...)

27 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A "must have" and a "must read". Excellent book., June 9, 2005

By	BENNARDO FRANCESCO (CASTROLIBERO (CS) ITALY) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

As I said in a past review to the second edition, this book is wonderful. This book has convinced me to migrate from Common Lisp to Scheme. This is a serious book for the one that really wants to learn about Scheme and require careful study and a strong motivation. Please note: if you are really interested to learn Scheme, then this book is for you; if you are not really interested and/or you like to joke, this book is absolutely not for you. The book is accurate, complete, well written and cover all you need about the modern Scheme. I use Scheme for personal study about bioinformatics. Thanks to the Autor.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good introduction but sometimes lacks clarity., January 18, 2008

By	V. Coetzee (Johannesburg, South Africa) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I purchased this book specifically with a view to learning the Scheme language. The text is easy to read, is pithy and to the point, and generally makes concepts clear and easy to understand. There are however, in my opinion, some sections where the author forgets that concepts are new to the reader and the examples that are used tend to obfuscate the point being made rather than elucidating it.

I have never considered myself stupid, but after my 5th reading of the introduction to continuations I was beginning to worry. A quick reading of another text on the subject cleared up my concerns almost immediately which suggests to me that the explanations are not as clear as they could be. There are some other areas of the book where this sort of assumption makes grasping a new concept more difficult than it should be.

Nonetheless, I still consider this a good introduction to the Scheme language and would gladly recommend it to the aspirant Schemer.